Hello there :) so we've finally left Laos and made it back into Thailand having had a pretty chilled out day in Luang Prabang which we've come to the conclusion is the calmest city ever. Literally everything and everyone moved at snail pace although it could also have something to do with the heat which, on the day we left, was roasting. It was like walking around with an electric blanket on you in the midday sun. I hope that explains if vividly enough. We spent our final day doing our last bit of sightseeing having decided it was really time to go to the royal palace museum and cement a bit of laos history in our head. unfortunarely we didn't emerge with much more information as the museum seemed to be a collection of artifacts and gifts from different countries, predominantly China. The most interesting part was an old laos folk story which Flo and I very much enjoyed....Anyhow, we left our home for the last week having said goodbye to jomas cafe for good (flo savoured her last ever piece of lemon bar) and after a very short plane ride, arrived in Chiangmai, Thailand. Are we glad to be back in Thailand. As soon as we landed and saw everything it felt like a mini homecoming, it was reassuring and welcoming!!! I'm sure after a month we'll be ready for a break but for the moment we're savouring the feeling. After a bit of a trek we found the red taxi like vehicles which are cheaper than tuk tuks, struck a bargain on the price and headed off to our hostel for the night picking up an array of people as we went. When we arrived it turned out that my name had been crossed off the list of people coming (bizarre) but we survived the minor hiccup and ended up in a 3 dorm room for the night. The bathroom was however locked and so one of the owners came to try and fix it. He couldn't seem to get in so he climbed up the wall, yes you heard me correctly he was like Spider-Man he was gripping the wall without any foot rests, and suddenly his hands and feet disappeared and he dropped over. Phew. And he fixed the door. Excitement over! We then had a very successful afternoon booking our train tickets down to koh phangan, we're on a sleeper train tonight and then immediately after arriving in Bangkok we're hopping on a day train down to the coast where we'll stay for the night before heading across the next morning! Woo beach :) anyhow back to chiang Mai. We had a lovely afternoon wandering the streets and eyeing up the many many temples here in unbelievably hot weather. We thought Luang Prabang was hot! Chiang Mai is much bigger and equipped for backpackers with recognisable shops everywhere including Starbucks, McDonald's and our personal favourite, boots! We're not complaining about the little taste of home having been away for over a month now. We had a delicious thai dinner and were very pleased to be able to meet up with Jackie again who we'd met in LP. Unfortunately we never made it to the night market due to illness on my part but the discovery of Boots cheered me up immensely and we all finished the night on a high after having a second dinner (our first was more of a soup so its allowed!) Today we're off to do a thai cooking class in order to 1 try and learn some tips (I'm not sure how great I'll be) and 2 stuff ourselves with food in preparation for the long journey. We've heard you can be full for over a day....
Our next update will be from the beach, hurrah! Send us updates on life back home, it's nice to hear from everyone!!
Lots of love
Tess and Flo xxx